Look But Don't Touch
by piaffe417
Summary: Alex tries to help Bobby during "A Person of Interest" but he won't let her get too close.


Author's Note/Spoiler Alert/Disclaimer: Ah, reruns! Thanks to a recent re-airing of "A Person of Interest," I give you this little fic-let that explores some missing scenes. (Raise your hand if you spent a lot of time during said episode mentally – or even really - screaming at evil Nicole/Elizabeth to just leave the poor man alone.) And, as always, your opinions are highly valued because I write not only to placate my muse, but also to entertain you, my fellow fans. (Just remember, I don't own them – which is okay because I can't afford to feed them anyway.)

Captain Deakins stepped up to Alex Eames' desk and closed the file folder she was thumbing through even though her hand was still in it, his demeanor resembling a recently deflated helium balloon.

"Go home," his words were soft but forceful.

"Captain…" Eames started to say.

"I don't care if it's only 4:00 and I don't care how much paperwork you still have to do," he told her. His tone was ragged and Alex sensed he was not in a mood to be argued with. "Go home. Get Goren and…"

He trailed off, then looked around quizzically as though it had only just occurred to him that they weren't together as they normally were. "Where is Goren anyway?"

She glanced automatically to her partner's desk and saw that it was empty. Her right shoulder, used to the comforting bulk of his presence behind her, also reported that he wasn't in the vicinity. Yet her lips somehow knew to form the words: "He's still in the interrogation room."

Deakins met her eyes with the look of a father chastising his daughter for losing her baby brother. The words he spoke, however, didn't lay blame, but instead belied his frustration with the situation they'd only just resolved. "Go get him and take him home. I don't want to see either of you back here until tomorrow – no excuses."

Alex knew there was no room to argue and told him quietly: "All right."

He patted her shoulder gently. "See you in the morning."

She nodded and turned towards the interrogation room, her footsteps filled with trepidation. She'd seen Bobby's face when Nicole Wallace (a.k.a. Elizabeth Hitchens) had been taken away in handcuffs a few minutes earlier and it wasn't good. His eyes had been clouded and his face a blank and impenetrable mask with only the barest shadow of relief showing in the corners of his sagging mouth. Usually he was triumphant after verbally sparring with a suspect, dark eyes dancing with the glow of success, but this victory had been tainted by his own personal demons – as Alex had feared it would be. She'd known that Bobby was right when he told her that he needed to beat Nicole at her own game and she'd also known that the game they would play would be a winner-take-all showdown and deeply personal. She hadn't known right away, though, that she wouldn't be in the room to referee the events as they occurred and had vehemently protested being pushed outside, leaving Bobby's back unprotected. 

She'd protested and she'd lost - and now Alex feared that Nicole's game had damaged Bobby beyond repair. Still, she was his partner – his best friend – and it fell to her to find him and pick up the pieces, to distinguish between what could be salvaged and what was a total loss. It always fell to her – but the damage had never been this extensive before and she didn't know if she possessed the right tools to fix him this time.

He was just where she'd known he'd be – in the interrogation room, facing the two-way mirror and standing spread-eagled, hands braced on the frame and forehead pressed to the glass. His eyes were cast downward, unseeing, and Alex froze in the doorway, her breath catching sharply in her throat. Just a few nights ago she'd seen him in this exact stance and it had been one of the most helpless moments of her life.

Alex hated to feel helpless – but Bobby hated it more and that was how they arrived here in the first place. He loathed it with the rancor of someone who had been force-fed the feeling to the point of choking on it and he went out of his way to avoid it whenever possible. It was an advantage in his work – he was careful and studied each case so thoroughly that he was prepared for every eventuality. Yet constantly fending off helplessness left him a disaster in his off-duty hours, rendering his relationships with most people tenuous at best and leaving him with a wealth of burned bridges to show for it. Alex knew that it was Bobby's aversion to (and deep-seated fear of) being helpless that kept him from having girlfriends who lasted more than a few weeks – or even a few dates – because ultimately the women required more of him than he was willing to give. Namely, serious relationships required love, the ultimate of helpless emotions, and Bobby had already been injured by that one as a boy, first when his father left and then when his mother retreated into a world of her own creation. 

Alex knew all of that about Bobby and more, as well she should. After all, she was his partner and, in fact, the closest thing he'd had to a long-term relationship with someone who wasn't a blood relative. They spent eight, nine, and sometimes even ten or twelve hours together at a stretch in what were often cramped quarters, making the term "close" an understatement when it came to describing their relationship. Alex was the one person who could read Bobby like a book, a skill she sometimes took for granted.

And that was why in a million years she could never have guessed that someone like Nicole would come along and not only usurp her position, but corrupt it for the sole purpose of hurting Bobby. And the knowledge that someone existed who could do that – who could out-Goren Bobby Goren with disastrous results – made Alex feel helpless. 

But not nearly as helpless as the aftermath made her feel, for now it was over and Nicole was on her way to jail. In her wake, she'd left Bobby hiding in the darkened interrogation room and drowning in that much-hated feeling he worked so hard to steer around – all while Alex stood in the doorway, unable to step inside.

***

The night Nicole returned hadn't been all that great to begin with, Alex had to admit. She and Bobby had both been in foul moods when they left work, Bobby more so because the press was crucifying him for the turn their latest case had taken – and he felt their scrutiny just. The suspect he had been so certain was guilty – Dr. Croyden - had committed suicide but later been proved innocent by new evidence and Bobby was plagued with guilt for being the catalyst that had driven the man over the edge. Yet conflicting with the idea that he had been wrong, Bobby was stuck on the notion that something about the case didn't add up - which Alex was forced to intuit because he wouldn't talk to her about it. He'd closed himself off to her and put up a sign that clearly said: "Look, but don't touch."

And Alex heeded the warning.

So, late that evening, disgusted with the situation and frustrated at her inability to help her partner – and his refusal to let her even try - she went home. By the time the phone rang, she was curled up in an afghan on the couch with a mug of tea watching _His Girl Friday_ with Cary Grant. She also had the reckless optimism to think that maybe by the morning things would have calmed to a simmer and Bobby would be better.

She was wrong.

The voice on the other end of the phone was Bobby's, but it wasn't the one she was used to. Usually when he called her at home, there was a particular urgency to the way he would greet her with, "Eames!" when she answered, implying that he'd just come across a useful theory and was so excited that he had to share his brilliance with someone before he burst. But this time was different. This Bobby sounded as though someone had suddenly pulled the floor from beneath his feet and left him standing in midair, flailing his arms in an effort to stay aloft. 

"Ea-Eames?" It was a question.

"Bobby, what's wrong?" She sat up so quickly she almost spilled her tea.

"Nicole Wallace did it," he said simply and without even seeing him, Alex knew he was running his right hand nervously across his face and through his hair while he paced back and forth with agitation.

"Nicole Wallace?" she repeated, the gears in her mind cranking to life. "But she left town."

"She's back and she did it," he insisted, his voice on the verge of cracking.

"Did what?" Alex wasn't trying to upset him further but asked as a reflex. Nicole Wallace had been part of a case several months back and, though she'd escaped their grasp and left a black mark on their impeccable record of closed cases, Alex couldn't figure out what she possibly could have done recently to agitate Bobby to this degree.

"She set me up," the words vibrated and she could tell he had stopped pacing for a moment. Then, softly and with that same desperation with which he'd greeted her, he said, "Alex? I need your help."

He'd called her Alex, something he never did, and she suddenly realized how dire the situation was, how close he was to the edge.

She never hesitated. "I'll call Deakins and Carver and we'll meet you at the office in twenty minutes."

When they'd all gathered in Deakins' office, Bobby poured out his theory about how Nicole Wallace/Elizabeth Hitchens had set him up to play the fool with the anthrax scare they'd pegged Croyden for, how she'd baited him personally every step of the way – even going so far as to murder Croyden and make it look like Bobby had driven him to suicide – and how he'd fallen for it. Every word he uttered was tipped with rage – and slathered in the guilt he still felt for Croyden's death.

During his rant, Deakins and Carver shot each other looks of trepidation from their positions on opposite sides of the room, alternating with sideways glances at Alex to gauge how she was interpreting her partner's manic behavior. Alex was too busy to acknowledge them, however, instead keeping a careful eye on Bobby while he strode wildly about the room and expounded to the trio, not listening to his words so much as watching his body language – and hating Nicole/Elizabeth/Whatever-Her-Real-Name-Was every step of the way. With unflinching calculation, the woman had proceeded to rip out Bobby's cowering psyche, stomp on it, and throw it back in his face - and if Alex could have, she would have gone right out, found the evil witch, and done the very same thing to all of her internal organs, one by one.

Yet while she was lost in a brief fantasy about scratching out Nicole/Elizabeth's eyes, Bobby walked out of the room. Without a word to Deakins or Carver (who had begun exchanging ideas between themselves) or to his partner, he'd simply walked out, his normally loose-joined stride uneven and dazed.

Deakins and Carver turned to stare at Alex again, though this time more pointedly. Neither seemed able to speak and she knew they were stunned to see the normally poised detective behaving in such a disjointed manner.

"I think we're done here," she told them, rising to her feet and following Bobby. "I'll get him home and we can start again tomorrow."

They'd nodded in agreement, both men's eyes relieved and sending her silent wishes of "good luck." Then she'd turned away to find her long-legged partner, finally locating him in the dark interrogation room at the end of the hall.

When she arrived, she discovered him with his hands resting on the bottom of the mirror, head bent downward in the most forlorn manner she'd ever seen. She'd often tried to picture Bobby as a child and it was usually hard, requiring her to mentally strip away three and a half feet from his height and erase the perpetual stubble on his jaw. But in that moment she didn't need any imagination because before her stood a giant, scared little boy and she wanted nothing more than to walk over, wrap him in her arms, and scream at the top of her lungs for Nicole and everyone else to leave him alone.

He began to speak, then, and his body trembled uncontrollably as he vented his anger and hurt to her, his voice small like the child he had been reduced to. He concluded softly with something Alex had always suspected but Bobby had never admitted, the real reason he had gone after Croyden, their now deceased suspect, with such tenacity - the reason Nicole had counted on from the beginning.

He spat the words: "She picked a man exactly like my father."

Alex thought again of reaching across the short distance between them to lay a gentle hand on his quaking arm, but stopped when she looked at him more closely. The sign was back up: "Look but don't touch." So much emotion bubbled beneath the surface that one touch was all it would take to make it boil over and Alex knew it wasn't a question of _if_ he would lash out at her, but how hard he would strike when he did.

It scared her. And the fact that in all her years of working with him she had never been afraid of Bobby scared her even more. She fought back tears of frustration and wracked her brain for a way to help the man before her – the man she couldn't touch. And as she thought about it, she realized that even in the best of times she and Bobby didn't have a relationship that involved a lot of physical contact. They worked comfortably in close proximity to each other, certainly, and Bobby's long legs usually ended up bumping into hers more often than not. In fact, his six-foot four-inch frame had become a permanent fixture over her right shoulder, but there were no playful pokes when they teased each other, no soothing pats on the shoulder when the work got too unsettling, and not even any grappling over each other's hands when they pored over case materials. That wasn't a part of their relationship - and that was why to pull him into her arms now, to breach that barrier, would not aid the situation. In fact, it would undoubtedly further complicate matters and that was the last thing she wanted to do. Yet how she was going to impart the sympathy and concern she was feeling without laying a hand on him would be tricky.

Ultimately, Alex settled on her usual show of solidarity – standing beside him unflinchingly while he worked through the tangled thoughts racing through his mind. It was all he would accept at the moment, all he was asking for, so she stood by him – for how long she couldn't remember - standing a few inches away, anchored in his wake and waiting for the moment when her words would be enough to guide him out of the darkened room.

***

Alex realized she'd been staring at her partner for a full two minutes and was still hesitant to walk through the door. Her mind raced as her eyes roamed over him, fearing that she'd never see that beacon of bright energy burning in those dark eyes again, that she'd never again see the sly smile he reserved for teasing her or the sympathetic one he offered when she needed his support.

She feared she'd lost her best friend and was looking at the shell he'd left behind.

"Bobby?" she finally ventured tentatively - hopefully.

He lifted his head as though the effort zapped what little strength he had left but when his eyes met hers, she felt the breath she had been unconsciously holding whoosh from her chest. The light shone from them – it was weak, but it was there.

She stepped closer, willed her voice not to shake with emotion, and told him, "The captain is sending us home. He wants us to leave our paperwork until tomorrow."

Bobby rose to his full height and swiveled his head on his neck to loosen the kinks in the way that usually annoyed her, but today she welcomed.

"Sounds like a good idea," his voice was soft but steadier than it had been.

"Come on," Alex said, grateful to have him back. "I'll drive you."

She turned to leave and took a few steps before realizing he wasn't with her. He had turned and was tracing an absent pattern on the table with the middle finger of his left hand, temporarily lost in thought again.

This time she didn't hesitate – she ignored the bold letters that had long cautioned her not to touch and crashed headlong through the barrier between them, laying a gentle hand on his arm. Instantly she felt a current go through her, like a shock from static electricity only without the bright pop. He must have felt it too because his eyes came to rest on her with a curious expression, one that recognized that something new had just occurred but that simultaneously wondered why it had never happened before.

"Bobby, let's go," she told him, locking her eyes on his and not loosening her grasp.

He nodded in agreement and followed silently as she led him out of the room and down the hall, her hand on his arm the entire time. And as they made their way to the car together, she vowed to never let go again.

FIN


End file.
